


Bargains

by Wrenlet



Category: Numb3rs
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-11-27
Updated: 2005-11-27
Packaged: 2018-10-25 11:25:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10763283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wrenlet/pseuds/Wrenlet
Summary: Alan pays a visit.





	Bargains

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers through episode 209, "Toxin."

This isn't a place Alan visits often. For the most part, he prefers to remember his wife in the places she'd loved, where she'd been most alive, rather than the cemetery plot she had never even seen.

Out of all the responsible things they had done in their married life -- setting money aside for the house and the tutors, pension funds and early retirement -- the one eventuality they hadn't prepared for had been the one that occurred. The subject came up when she was diagnosed, but Alan had told her no, it wasn't time. It wasn't _her_ time. He'd rationalized that it would be like giving up, in a way, might even interfere with her recovery and she had let him get away with the dodge, for a while. When it became clear recovery wasn't in the cards for them, she was too weak to leave the house and Don had come with him instead. Or rather, Don had _taken_ him to purchase a grave for his wife.

Don had been like a rock, a solid pillar of reasoned strength that his mother had been openly grateful for and Alan had quietly leaned on when his own strength failed him in a few key matters. Losing her had been so hard on both boys... it's still hard, which is why he is here.

"I'm sorry."

It does her no honor, the things he has in his head right now, what he said to his sons and what he'd stopped before admitting out loud. Don had the right of it, as usual; there could be no just end from tainted means and a drug company willing to kill to protect itself, that was about as tainted as you could get. Charlie hadn't said, but Alan knew he still found it difficult to speak about his mother and had never liked choosing sides.

Alan goes down on one knee, and reaches to brush a bit of stray grass from the base of the headstone. He will never say it, but he can imagine the hardness in Don's eyes, the shock on Charlie's features if Alan told them he wouldn't care if a thousand, ten thousand people died of a drug that saved his wife, it would be worth it to still have her with him.

"We've raised our sons to be better men than I am, Margaret. You would be so proud."


End file.
